Editor’s note: This commentary is by Elayne Clift, who writes about women, health, politics and social issues from Saxtons River.
[W]hen I was a child my father owned a prosperous haberdashery in the New Jersey town where we lived. He was a proud man who, with my mother, built a reputation around quality clothing for men. In the 1950s they built a three-bedroom brick home, modest by today’s standards, but impressive then, and a step up from the apartment we occupied above the store.
I watched my father lose it all when my mother became chronically ill and her care drained the coffers. I saw the shame and defeat in his face when he lost the store and had to work as a floor salesman in the men’s department of a low-quality box store. I was there when the sheriff came to tag our furniture when he went bankrupt.
As author Neal Gabler has noted, “Unless you’ve lived it, you can’t know what it feels like.”
Gabler wrote an article a while back for The Atlantic called “The Secret Shame of Middle Class Americans.” It made me recall my visceral fear of financial distress that many people are now feeling as we look ahead to a Trump presidency. The heartbreaking testimonials he’d shared from people who had their savings wiped out or were homeless because they’d lost their job, the stories of families who were living paycheck to paycheck, the tales of parents terrified of illness or being laid off were all too familiar.
A 91-year-old friend of mine told me just before she died that she was glad to be at the end of her life because she didn’t like what the country was coming to.
Neal Gabler understood the fear of financial collapse because he had his own money worries despite being well-educated, employed and hardworking. He was, he said, in the nearly 50 percent of Americans surveyed by the Federal Reserve Board in 2013 who claimed they wouldn’t be able to meet a $400 emergency without selling something or borrowing the money.
Gabler is a successful writer who works seven days a week, drives an old Toyota he inherited from his father, has no credit cards, and hasn’t taken a vacation in over 10 years. For a long time, he felt ashamed of his situation. But when he realized he wasn’t alone and hadn’t done anything to put himself and his family in their financial predicament, he delved into the “financial impotence” so many Americans are feeling. His in-depth article offered plenty of facts and figures that confirmed the financial brink so many families are living on. But here’s his key point: “Either a sizable minority or a slim majority of Americans are on thin ice financially.” This remains true even though the economy recovered under an Obama administration from a terrible crisis and is once again showing signs of a strong rebound.
As Gabler pointed out, “financial impotence is an equal-opportunity malady.” He wasn’t writing only about white middle-class people with advanced degrees and decent jobs. He was also writing about African-Americans, Hispanics, and various low-income people having even fewer financial resources to help them cope.
The same is true for many young couples. Fast approaching midlife or at the pinnacle of their careers, they may be products of good colleges and excel in their respective professions. But many of them are working freelance or consulting because the days of The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit trotting off to large companies laden with benefits and retirement plans are over. These workers have to buy their health insurance, start IRAs, and hope that no crises eat into their slim savings. Many of them can’t move into first homes and some, if they live in large cities like New York, may well be unable to afford a one-bedroom apartment, so they scrunch together in small spaces. Imagine what living arrangements others with less well-paid jobs cobble together.
In 2014, a USA Today analysis concluded that “the American Dream, defined by middle-class benchmarks identified by the US Commerce Department, would require an income of $130,000 a year for an average family of four,” but median income in 2014 was roughly half that, which made it impossible for anyone to save for a rainy day. As Neal Gabler put it, we continue to live “in an ongoing storm.” The effect of this reality on our well-being and “national spirit” is only beginning to be charted at a time when our new president, his billionaire advisers, Cabinet, and other buddies pose serious threats to an already fragile system.
A 91-year-old friend of mine told me just before she died that she was glad to be at the end of her life because she didn’t like what the country was coming to. I can relate. But I feel profoundly sad for those who follow us because, surely, future generations deserve more than the current reality, even if it’s only a night out for dinner or a room to call their own.
